Open Letter to Kevin & Alex

The confusion of the past couple days as both sides worked furiously to get their slates -- and alliances -- in order ahead of the filing deadline for the March primary election should be resolved by midweek when most of the head-counting is officially over. In the meantime can both of you agree on one thing: keeping the partisan yapping to a minimum should be a goal of some of the publicly paid-for political appointees?

My gripe in particular is the way Summit County Board of Elections Director Bryan Williams comes off in Stephanie Warsmith's coverage of the ongoing Coughlin-v-Arshinkoff saga. Stephanie's usually dead on with her quotes, so I think it's unlikely Williams was misrepresented in her Akron Beacon Journal story this morning.

I'm not so naive to think that political appointees don't have strong opinions about their masters (good and bad); I'm actually a fan of the spoils system since having to answer to a political boss may sometimes be a better deal in the long run for citizens since it's easier to bring pressure on an errant bureaucrat who can't hide behind Civil Service protections when unwarranted.

The particular quote that really got my goat this morning was this one: ''The guy can't produce what he says he's going to produce,'' Williams told the ABJ in reference to Coughlin. Funny how those observations weren't made in public while both were serving down in Columbus in elected positions a few years ago. Maybe it's payback for thinking Coughlin didn't help Williams enough in that 2003 mess of a Akron Mayor's race...

Now I don't have a problem with Alex letting fly with the dig to Coughlin; both of the Dons (Plusquellic and Robart) do it with ease, as well as my blue pals on NewsNight and that's OK; they're either elected as political animals or express their opinion thanks to the journalist hats they wear. But Williams is a different animal: he's supposed to be the administrator in charge of the Board of Elections and while he has his post because of politics he should be wise enough to avoid sounding like a candidate while holding down that job. His predecessors knew the difference, as do most officials (appointed or elected) to oversee the people's business of making good on democracy's promise of a fairly-run and rightly-counted election process.

It's when they step over the line and become obvious toadies for their political masters that they get in trouble. Any doubts ought to be erased with the memory of Ken Blackwell's wearing of the handling of the 2004* election around his neck when he ran for Governor in 2006*. The tag of a too-partisan election official helped mobilize opposition to people and groups around the country who probably couldn't even point to Columbus on a map, but the tag stuck and was a great opportunity for partisans to step in and helped sink Blackwell's aspirations.

It wasn't just because of that one reason, but it didn't help.

Alex could fight this fight for himself or even let surrogates such as popularly-elected supporters such as Cuyahoga Falls Mayor Don Robart play the front man in this battle. What should be clear is the role of workers, including management, at the Elections should at least provide the appearance everyone will get a fair shake, even if the bosses can't wait to sink in the knife.

*dates corrected 1/6; thanks to John Dziurlaj at the University of Akron for catching my error.